Each time I see a Sycamore

Each time I see a      Sycamore

I wonder what the hell it’s for.

It doesn’t even drop its leaves

In season like the other trees.

Nor make I any sense of its

Eternal bark psoriasis.

Among things furnitureal

Its presence is mercurial.

Perhaps its bumpy tumorous wood

Is hard to carve or shape, no good

For rails, panels, spans or dowels

On which might hang miswoven towels.

In columns they line boulevards

And singly found in some backyards

Where graciously their shade provides

Refreshing coolness while it hides

Picnic tables, swings with seats

From the summer’s cruelest heats

Although not well. The maples and the oaks

Shadow with far darker cloaks.

Perhaps one answer I have found

While casting all these thoughts around:

This tree whose wood’s so decorously curly

Supplies unique veneers called burly?

Of all sylvan varieties 

The Sycamores are garbage trees

Because of their relentless droppings:

Seeds, twigs, branches, other ploppings

Too numerous to mention

And on this point there’s no dissension.

Patience, my eager granite, wait

        Patience, my eager granite, wait.

         Suffice for now to list my birth.

         That space for when I leave this earth

         Reserve, I need not know the date.

         Blessed are they who have no stones

         To chide them of life’s bounded course.

         Must I a somber life enforce

         Before they burn my wretched bones?

         No; soon will I with my love lie

         Whose ashes are herein interred.   

        ‘Til then by grief my life’s deferred,

         And for how long? I can’t descry.

         Perhaps once all the tears are done

         And thoughts of her don’t choke my breath  

         I’ll be then free enough of death

        To stop subtracting days by one. 

A rose by any other name . . .

This picture could easily be a "recruiting poster" for al Qaeda in Iraq. It is only one of many photographs taken by US military personnel stationed at Abu Ghraib and circulated among other soldiers until finally leaked to the media.

Happy 10th Anniversary of Abu Ghraib!

How time flies when we're having fun. April 28, 2014, is the tenth anniversary of the release on Sixty Minutes II of the first pictures from Abu Ghraib which awakened America to its role as a garden variety torturing power in the 21st century--Cheney's dabbling in the "dark side."

You would have thought we as a modern nation would decry such policies, or at least significantly debate them, possibly even have the courage to prosecute the authorizers and perpetrators of such blatant violations of our military code, body of national laws, and international conventions. You would have thought so given our nominal "principles." 

There are so many terrible policies which flow from our failure as a nation to call torture by its right name and our failure to hold the people accountable for their evil deeds. But to do so in President Obama's opinion would be "looking back," when he'd rather we "look forward." 

"Forward to what," we should ask . . . further retrenchment from our beloved principles? Say like authorizing the killing of American citizens without due process? Yep. We do that now. Say like authorizing the deaths of women and children by remote control drones because we can't "efficiently" capture terrorist suspects and try them in our own courts or, God forbid, in international courts? Yep. We do that too. 

Karen Greenberg reviews the whole story up to today which, while it's not comfortable reading, is timely and necessary. Not to review this horrid condition would be to redon the moral blinders prepared for us by both the Bush and Obama administrations. [cf., Dangerous Recent Reading: The Necessity(?) of Evil in War TWT&NB March 2014, especially remarks about Adolph Eichmann in Eichmann in Jerusalem]

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175836/tomgram%3A_karen_greenberg%2C_abu_ghraib_never_left_us/#more

Daddy Volunteer for the Zoo Field Trip

 The PDZenani, a female mandrill, looks over her new surroundings in the
Primate, Cat, and Aquatics Building at the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo.
 The prominent and colorful facial striations turned out not to be the most
fascinating anatomical feature of the mandrills to the third graders.

My youngest, Nat, was in the third grade when I was magically volunteered (as devoted husbands and fathers sometimes are) to be Daddy Helper for the spring field trip to the zoo. Since the other parent volunteers were women (a fact which will figure prominently later in  this story) it was daunting for me to assume any authority among the youngsters. They were by this age conditioned to hear only a woman's voice during school hours. Ensuing events, which I sincerely regret, proved otherwise . 

A charming day, replete with warm sun, safe travel, relatively controlled young passengers who stayed seated as instructed and who thanked the driver as they got off the yellow bus and walked carefully to the meeting spot near the ticket area. Our best strategy was to stay together as a group so that no portion of us got too far ahead or too far behind. Parent volunteers played border collies and kept the herd in a bunch by rerouting the wayward and the stragglers and returning the avant garde to the mother ship. 

For the most part the kids were pretty good. No fighting, no screaming, occasional running--all in all better than I had expected. As the morning wore on and the Rain Forest gradually lost its appeal, chatter surfaced about, "When are we going to see some animals?" By animals I think they meant bellowing beasts. The kids were tiring out from all the walking. Scientific explanations quickly proved "boring" and the buzz among the boys reverted to video games and among the girls to "tween" magazines.

With lunch came the promise of going to see some "animals" in the afternoon. Their spirits picked up following the sandwiches and milk, but since the rest of the zoo involved considerably more walking, and the prospect of "bellowing beasts" was heartily thrashed by seeing lions curled up snoozing at the far ends of their cages to escape the afternoon sun, the little buggers grew more irritable and given to more "boring." 

Finally, after about an hour of wandering through most of the outdoor animal areas, we came upon the indoor display for the primates. Like the lions our munchkins were glad to be out of the sun and in some air conditioning. We could easily all get a good view as there was plenty of glass for us to line up along. I tried to get them interested in the differences of the species housed in each section as we passed. 

We had come upon the mandrills--one of whom was "up close and personal," within a foot of the glass and staring straight at me. I called to my laggards, "Hey, kids come look at these guys with the colorful striations on their cheeks." However, as I hinted in the caption of the picture above, the face was not the only colorful feature of the mandrills. 

As the children approached the glass where I was going to knowledgeably and authoritatively discuss the pronounced features of the mandrill's facial cheeks, another mandrill, climbing a nearby limb, showed off  its huge posterior cheeks, glowing with a polished redness heretofore found only on fire engines or teachers' apples. The kids found it impossible to ignore the errant mandrill to come see mine. "Wow! What an ass!" they screamed as more and more scrambled to see what was the fuss.  

Not only the children but my sister volunteers and the third grade teacher herself came by to see what got the children so excited. Without saying a single instructive word I turned to wander away from my mandrill who, to his credit, kept looking at me as I departed, perhaps himself sensing the lost learning opportunity.

Across the room was another variety of primate of whom one was grooming another near the glass as I approached. Through my mind I practiced what I would say about the social nature of primate life where one was picking bugs from the fur of the other's back and how this behavior solidified a group or family consciousness among the members of that species. 

The hubbub at the mandrill display had died down thanks to the efforts of the teacher and the other volunteers. We would soon be leaving the zoo they explained. Now with only one chance left to restore my dignity I again called out to the kids, "I'd like you to see this." 

The words left my lips and the grooming ceased. The male primate who had been being groomed turned to face the glass. From his crotch began unrolling what I thought was some cheroot about nine inches long and half an inch in diameter. Only it was not a cheroot.

I could hear the kids crossing the room to see again what Mr. Manista wanted to show them. 

The bus ride home was relatively quiet. Some of the kids fell asleep. Nobody talked to me on the way back to the school or after as the kids reassembled in their classroom. 

I imagined the conversations at the dinner tables of the third graders who had been to the zoo: "The other helpers were moms. But we had this guy too, Nathaniel's daddy. He wasn't much until the last building where he showed us some of the coolest stuff." 

Fortunately the phone didn't ring the entire evening.

Survivor Star Magnolia

Spring 2014 and the White Star Magnolia survived. (cf., "Oh What A Night!" March 2013)

Earning (and Trying to Live on) Minimum Wages in America Today, Part I

You may not know Peter Van Buren* unless you've been keeping track of what happens to whistleblowers in this country. Peter worked for the State Department, lastly in Iraq, and drew on those experiences to author We Meant Well: How I helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People. 

Because he had the temerity to speak openly about the shoddy work of the State Department in Iraq during the war he was promptly given the boot on publication of his book. Eventually his resources ran out and he had to seek work in the post 2008 economy--which meant he had to look for a minimum wage job at age 53. 

Last post I took a class warfare stance toward the abomination our democracy and economy have become. I will underscore that with urging you to read Peter's article linked below. Not since Barbara Ehrenreich wrote Nickel and Dimed: On Not Getting By in America has anyone written as succinctly about trying to live on the minimum wage as has Peter Van Buren in the article below. 

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175835/tomgram%3A_peter_van_buren%2C_i%27m_a_whistleblower%3A_want_fries_with_that/#more 

*Peter Van Buren is one of the few whistleblowers who have not served jail time as John Kiriakou is now for openly discussing torture in the CIA or as is Chelsea Manning for showing American war crimes in Iraq or as Edward Snowden is virtually exiled to Russia by Attorney General Holden's promise of his prosecution for his revelation that all our communications are open to NSA recording and inspection (Hi, Barack).

In his early and innocent years candidate Obama talked a strong suit about whistleblowers deserving government protection. But then he also talked about closing Guantanamo and reforming the immigration mess, among other things. (Good night, Barack.)

Why Don't We Stop the Rich from Getting Richer? Part I

Economics-- "Dismal Science"--Not necessarily

We've been told by the bankers, banking is way too complicated to leave to the likes of taxpayers such as we. "Just trust us," they say and have been saying since we bailed out their collective asses over the years since 2008. 

But we are not so stupid anymore. We can see that the ranks of the middle class are diminishing. The wages of workers have been flat since 1980. And, for some of us, who now have time to read, we can both learn and understand why it's all happening.

Watching the linked Bill Moyers interview with Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman of Princeton may stir your curiosity. I know I'll be reading it as soon as I can get my grubby little hands on a copy.

http://billmoyers.com/video/